I Feel Like a Boy Let Out of School!

This is the first of a four part series about Doc’s journey of adjustment to terminal illness and disability (read part 2, 3, 4). Each story is individually valuable but, together, they tell a story that is inspirational. I believe we can all learn something from Doc, as we observe his progression.

Doc was the only physician in a small rural town and was a “country” doctor in every sense of the word. His office was attached to the front of his house. Appointments weren’t necessary; first come first serve. There were many late night office and home visits at the request of neighbors. He seemed to belong to the town and the town to him. He could hardly get away from his practice. His son remembered them going to the county fair and people stopping to tell him about their aches and pains. Doc was soft spoken and had a very subtle sense of humor. He was a prankster. He grinned as he told me about how he and his brother filled a weather balloon with natural gas, attached and lit a fuse, and released it into the night sky. After gaining altitude it burst into a huge rolling ball of fire. The next day the entire town was buzzing about the UFO siting. Doc spent most of his life treating his community but this time he was the patient. He was 69 years old when referred to Hospice for cancer of the kidney.

It took us little time to get down to talking about his illness. During my first visit Doc confided, “ I almost died last week. I was adjusting my insulin and gave myself too much. I went into an insulin reaction and I could feel myself slipping away, like I was leaving my body. I thought about the things I still needed to do and I told myself I wasn’t ready to die. I had to concentrate because it would have been easy to slip away.” I told Doc that I wouldn’t ask him what the things were he needed to do, but I would ask him if he did them when I returned. Two weeks passed and I returned. As promised, I asked, “Did you do them?” and he replied, “Yes”. I asked how he felt and he stated, “I feel like a boy let out of school. You know how you feel when you are out of school for the summer, when all your work is done. Everyone knows what it’s like to be let out of school.”

If you were in Doc’s shoes would you be ready to go or would you be saying, “There are things I have to do”? Doc told me the things he did to prepare. He had an attorney come to the house to complete estate planning; he talked with family members and he made peace with God. He stated, “I am fortunate that I’ve had the time to prepare.” Are you prepared? Is your work caught up? When your work is done you will feel like a boy let out of school; free. Unfinished business due to procrastination is one of the greatest causes of stress, because it preoccupies our minds and renders a part of us unavailable to the present. Death will always be an interruption; there will always be something else to do; someplace else to go, but some things are of eternal importance, so don’t put them off. Let’s live each day fully and try to stay caught up.

“Come now, you who say, today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, and engage in business and make a profit. Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away.” (James 4:13-15)

Also read:
Part 2
Part 3